Axis History Forum

This is an apolitical forum for discussions on the Axis nations and related topics hosted by the Axis History Factbook in cooperation with Christian Ankerstjerne’s Panzerworld and Christoph Awender's WW2 day by day.
Founded in 1999.

If the victorious Allies would have supported the existence of a Ukrainian state after the end of World War I (something which they should have done IMHO given that there was no guarantee that Russia was going to shake off Bolshevik rule), how much higher would the odds be of an independent Ukrainian state surviving after the end of World War I would have been?

As you hopefully know, Poland and the Baltic countries were able to retain their independence after the end of WWI while Ukraine unfortunately couldn't (and neither could the Caucasian republics--though Ukraine is far more important than they are due to Ukraine's much larger population). In turn, this makes me wonder if there was some way to change this and to prevent Ukraine from falling to the Bolsheviks in 1919-1921.

Ukrainians are one of the few peoples whose fate would have been better off had the Central Powers won WWI and thus I am wondering if there was any way for the Allies to win WWI and yet for Ukraine to retain its independence (even under a new government) and avoid Communism (at least until the 1930s or 1940s).

Anyway, any thoughts on this?

Also, FTR, it appears that Ukraine indeed had its own delegation to the 1919 Paris Peace Conference--where they presented this proposal for an independent Ukraine's borders:

These were ultimately the borders that Ukraine got in 1991 with the exception of Rostov and the Kuban (both of which remained under Russian rule)--borders which Ukraine kept until 2014 when it lost Crimea and also de facto lost a large part of the Donbass.

This topic reminds me of a previous comment by Michael Mills either on this forum or on another forum where he said that it's ironic that the Western Powers supported Russia's claim to Ukraine at the 1919 Paris Peace Conference only to condemn Russian aggression against Ukraine almost a century later.

My, oh my, how times have changed! Had they had the benefit of hindsight, I wonder if the politicians and decision-makers at the 1919 Paris Peace Conference would have made a different decision in regards to Ukraine (even if they wouldn't have ultimately been able to get their decision to stick).

Britain and France fully supported the territorial integrity and interests of Russia (temporally controlled by the Soviet rebels) - their former ally. As result, they were merciless towards people trying to escape "the prison of nations."

Poland was viciously attacked by the Allies the moment Piłsudski anounced his plan supporting the already existing Ukraine state.
France was anti-Soviet only because the Soviet declared substantial French loans to Russia null and void.
Lloyd George, who additionally believed the Soviets could have been tamed by trading with them, declared that nothing wrong with a conquest of Poland by the Soviets.

Lots of anti-Polish memes, persisting to this day were introduced by the British right then, that the Poles were imperialists (although the Russian Empire invaded and partitioned Poland), Poland was conflicted with all its peaceful neighbors (Czechoslovakia was conflicted with all its neighbors too, and in fact all East European countries), that the Czechs were peaceful and progressive folks (when in fact they allocated to themselves lands populated almost homogenously by Germans, Hungarians, Poles).